One Looked Up, Grinning, And Said
by Spawn Guy
Summary: Two brothers, one hatred.


A high place in New York City. A man in a suit with a hunter's face. A crash of claws behind him. A monster.

"Take. It. _Off_."

"It _was _getting a trifle stuffy."

A hand, removing the Hunter's face, giving way to the Chameleon.

"Hello, Sergei."

A growl.

"Kraven barley allowed you to use the Kravinoff family name when we were younger, Smerdyakov. You should know better now that you're older."

A smile.

"Ah, yes. Such memories."

A raised eyebrow, an appraising look.

"I see that you've…grown."

A purring grunt.

"An unnatural process to maintain the natural order. Evolution."

"Personally I have always preferred survival through adaptation."

A fanged smile.

"Camouflage. A mouse pretending to be a leopard."

"When the Cat's away."

A challenging smirk.

"And you played a lot of games when people weren't looking, didn't you Sergei? Certainly the noble name of Kravinoff allowed a certain amount of time in the limelight, but Kraven always did his best work in the shadows. All those animals the mighty hunter rose up and saved instead of abandoning to be put down: all every heroic to them. Much more satisfying for you."

A more definite grunt.

"Your point?"

"Many of the men and many more of the women I have worked for have reminded me of you, Sergei. You think the world turns for you and you're angry whenever it doesn't stop for you, mostly because then you never get what you want. You either have to hire someone to lie and steal to get it for you, or you have to lie yourself."

A glint of lengthening claws.

"Kraven never lies!"

"And I think that's why you may have been loosing those games for so long. And regardless, that was entirely addressed to Kravinoff. Who spent quite some time lying if we're honest."

A step forward.

"All that skill, all that training. The nobleman didn't learn any of it to save an endangered species. He was teaching himself how to be the hunter."

A smile.

"The nobleman got to be the savage he always wanted to be."

A sneer.

"When the hunter couldn't get what he wanted, he became the super villain."

A looming shadow, a mountainous roar.

"This is between Kraven and prey! Do not mention the Spider again! You were never part of my pack!"

"Was that why you never really liked me, Sergei? Because you couldn't pretend I wasn't your step-brother?"

An sharp, accusing claw.

"You were weak."

A shrug.

"I was honest about it at least. And through that I managed to make a very profitable career out of lying. Not entirely unlike you."

A thunderclap, a web of cracks in concrete as claws slam down in frustration, hateful, snarling breathing.

"What do you want of Kraven? Why are you here?"

"Professional courtesy-I heard you were working with the Master Planner, and decided to alert you to my recent contract in New York so we wouldn't interfere with each other-and…personal curiosity."

A long stare between each.

"I helped contribute to the Spider-Man's notoriety myself, but when I heard the rumours that you had…changed yourself, I had to see if you were the same man I remembered."

A contemptuous animal snort.

"So you stood here with Kravinoff's face waiting for Kraven, a snake taunting a lion. Well?"

"I take many identity's in some ways to make up for the short coming of my own. You have taken this new identity so that you may truly be what you really are. What you were in our childhood."

A contemptuous glare.

"You're the same beast I remember."

A harsh bark of laughter.

"And has the master of disguise anything worthwhile to share with Kraven?"

"Have you looked at a calendar the entire time you and the Sinister Six spent wasting time with Spider-Man? Or were you too busy sharing your food?"

A long, low growl.

"Speak sense or end in chaos."

"It is Mothers Day."

A roar like a thunderstorm, a blur of motion, a yawning, gaping fall suddenly under a dangling Chameleon. A furious Kraven.

"DO NOT SPEAK OF HER!"

"She was my mother too, Sergei."

A long, hateful look, deep into feline eyes.

"And she would be ashamed of you."

A moment of hesitation, anger shuddering as it suddenly comes to a cold, hard halt.

"All this time looking down at me, building up the purity of the Kravinoff bloodline. And you go a dilute it with some poison so you can be the beast you always wanted to be. The last trace of her on this earth, and you have alienated your family-_my_ family-from any real pride ever again because of your own bestial ego. She'd hate you a thousand times more than you ever hated me."

A cry of pain as Sergei silently tosses Dmitri aside, stares at his hands.

A hateful glare at broad fur rimmed shoulders.

"You have…a gift?"

"Indeed I do."

A silver case, drawn delicately from a suit pocket. A glint of gold as it opens. A locket.

"It took me many years to find this. The last operation I preformed with Beck and Mason some time ago."

A glint of shared bestial pain in two sets of human eyes.

"It matches the one you keep of father in your quarters whenever you travel the world, so that he may stay with you. I even had a new photograph of…of her placed in it when I had it restored."

A pause. An offering. A large, hesitant hand paw gently grasping the locket.

"I…Kraven does not…"

"Do not mistake this for camaraderie, brother."

A cold stare, twice as hateful.

"I've had to carry the knowledge of my failure to our family with me my entire life. Now you can too."

A moment of pained hesitation as Kraven stares at the unsmiling, proud photograph.

"Dmitri…"

A silence. An emptiness behind him that wasn't there a few seconds ago.

A demon left alone upon a high place.

---

Done because it baffles the mind that most people don't get that Kat Kraven is Spectacular's shot gun in the mouth. And because I actually like the idea of a Chameleon that gets one over on that shirtless jerk. Also an excuse to get my Stephen Crane on.


End file.
